


In a Dark Universe

by Magichorse



Series: Dark Universe [1]
Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: Alcohol, Bones and Blood, Canon-adjacent, Dubcon - power imbalance, F/F, Harrow the Ninth Spoilers (Locked Tomb Trilogy), HtN - Chapter 31, Missing Scene, Nav is there technically, Necromancers getting handsy, POV Second Person, The Body is also there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:35:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26035762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magichorse/pseuds/Magichorse
Summary: “Perhaps there was a dark universe in which you reached for her…”(Harrow the Ninth, Chapter 31)In which the scene between Harrowhark and Ianthe after the dinner party went the other way, and Harrowhark let Ianthe kiss her instead.
Relationships: Harrowhark Nonagesimus & Ianthe Tridentarius, Harrowhark Nonagesimus/Ianthe Tridentarius
Series: Dark Universe [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1924534
Comments: 13
Kudos: 121





	In a Dark Universe

**Author's Note:**

> Based on that tantalizing little line TM gave us in the hallway scene.

Ianthe’s high-heeled shoes swung from the gilded bones of her right hand as she gestured, hissing breathless obscenities about God and His Saints as you both fled down the empty corridor of the Mithraeum. You kept pace with her, thanks in part to the arm she had thrown around your shoulders, but your breath was coming in gasps from the effort.

“ _Ugh!_ ” She was groaning, unable to conjure up that air of bored disinterest she usually kept around her like the smoke that wreathed Augustine. “Can you _believe_ them, Harry— _disgusting_. Old people should be shot.”

For your part, you couldn’t get the image of God’s hands on God’s holy Lyctors out of your head, but you were trying. The alcohol made it difficult to banish the images. Your brain kept sliding right back, treating you to an unwelcome loop of sacrilegious filth. 

You were also aware of a growing feeling of claustrophobia. Ianthe’s flesh arm slung about your shoulders was appallingly overfamiliar, an affront to your person. She was, you thought with a mild, diffuse panic, too close. And you were too drunk. The heat of her, and the now-familiar smell of her, was stressing your already overwrought nerves.

You made to duck out of the enclosure of her arm, saying, “I thank you for your part in this, Tridentarius,” when that arm slipped off your shoulders of its own accord. You were momentarily relieved until you realized the arm had not gone, but slid smoothly down to the small of your back as if to pull you in for a dance. Gracefully, Ianthe half-stepped around to the front of you, and you found yourself pressed flush to her.

Somehow, you were surprised by this, even though you knew perfectly well how she looked at you, especially when she was certain you’d catch her at it, like a sly-eyed predator. Her desire for you had never been a secret, and you were currently both slightly hysterical and very drunk.

Your eyes flicked up startled to meet hers, which were now a sunset of blue over hazel. Her cheeks were flushed with the exertion of your shared flight, giving a rare touch of loveliness to her too-pale skin. Her lips were a luminous red where they had split and bled. You watched mutely, mesmerized, as her bare and delicate shoulders curled down towards you and she leaned her face in close to yours. You saw she meant to kiss you.

You could have avoided it. Just the slightest turn of your head would have let those bloody lips brush harmlessly along the edge of your jaw instead. 

But you didn’t.

You saw her coming on and, with trembling fingers, you _reached_ for her. 

Your fingers grasped her lightly beneath the chin and guided her mouth the last few centimeters to press firmly into yours. For a moment the silence in that corridor was absolute, and then, you heard a nearby sound that must have been the _clack_ of Ianthe’s shoes abandoned to fall to the floor. A half-second later her skeletal hand came up to slide cool fingertips along the nape of your neck, cradling the base of your skull. Her kiss was warm, and at the instant when your lips touched, she made a soft sound in the back of her throat that made your heartbeat quicken. 

After that first gentle press, Ianthe pulled back just far enough to meet your eyes again. Beneath the warm haze of alcohol, that sharp, cold intellect stared out at you. This, then, was your warning. This was your chance to walk away, perhaps blushing stiffly, pretending you had forgotten yourself. Or, better, you could have raised your palm, fused the bones, and slapped that leering face so hard teeth sprayed down the hall.

But, again, you didn’t. 

You had been sorely tried in the past six months. You had somehow found yourself friendless, heartsick, homesick, and hunted at the very edge of the known universe. You hurt so deeply some days, you weren’t sure there would ever be a bottom to it. Ianthe took an exultant pleasure from your suffering, but she _saw_ it. She was the only one within a billion-light-year-radius who could even begin to know what you felt. Your fingers trembled against her cheek. You did not pull away. 

Ianthe grinned like a card player who has just drawn the winning hand, and started into motion.

She spun you and pressed your back up against the nearest skeleton-adorned wall, right there in the open sacred hallway of the Mithraem, and covered your mouth again with hers. You kissed her back desperately, and the two of you tangled like two shameless, amorous beasts. You didn’t care. Let Ianthe strip you right there before the anointed eyes of the holy dead if she wanted. She had seen your bare face, she had been party to your secret madness, there was no way you could have been more naked to her, and you found that, somehow, the admission brought you an enormous relief. 

Your hand abandoned her cheek to press fingertips into the points of vertebrae along her neck, pressing her close. You kissed her hard enough to split her wounds anew. She moaned at the sting. Of course she would. Her blood spilled into your mouth, a hot mingling of iron tang with thalergetic burst. How often had you tasted your own blood? How shockingly intimate you found it was to taste another’s. 

Ianthe ran her tongue over her torn lip and dragged her mouth to your ear, murmuring, “Damn me thrice, I didn’t think you had it in you, you pinch-faced little nun,” and she sounded just the slightest bit awed, “Full of surprises as always…Nonagesimus.” You practically whimpered at the use of your old name, but she went on, “Guess I want to ravish you after all. That's understandable, it was so hot watching you writhe miserably back there at the party. But what’s gotten into _you,_ I wonder, _Reverend Daughter?_ ”

You gave a breathy little laugh that didn’t sound sane at all—it was too high pitched, like an aborted scream, but you regained enough of yourself to quip, “Shut up the _hell_ up, you sadistic harpy.”

“I can just read between the lines for you,” she drawled, heedless, “You’ve been flinching and cringing away from me for months because you knew you’d fling yourself at me at the slightest provocation. Come now, admit it. You’ve wanted this.”

You began to remove your hand from Ianthe’s moon-pale locks, which was a farce of a threat, if you were being honest with yourself. Ianthe fell for it, though, shutting up and catching your wrist before it disentangled itself.

“All right, _all right,_ ” she huffed, and then, more lowly, “God, I’ve wanted this.”

“Don’t talk to me about God,” you said harshly, but slid your hand back into her hair.

“Agreed,” said Ianthe wryly, and bent her head back down to yours. 

You turned your face up to receive a kiss but she merely brushed her lips by yours and planted her mouth firmly at the side of your neck. Those perfect white teeth came to rest with the barest of pressure against your throat, and your eyes fluttered shut at the sensual, rough scrape of bone dragging on skin. You thrilled at the sensation, and your hands sought her body. You caressed your fingers down her sides, counting her silk-covered ribs as you went, and brought both hands to rest on the points of her hips. Feeling the slide of bone beneath skin beneath fabric gave you another dark thrill. As when you had pulled a new arm from her living bone, you sensed into her body, and the construction of her lit up for you. You had never seen someone so truly naked as that. It took your breath. 

You lost concentration as Ianthe’s human hand slipped from the lumbar of your back to the crest of your own slender hip to hold you still while she shifted her position. She gave a small huff of annoyance as the folds of her smoky lavender gown tangled with the fabric of yours—a hazard of the trade—and then, offending fabric pulled roughly aside, she slid one thigh firmly between yours in a way that shut your rational mind down completely.

No one had ever touched you there before. 

You had always dreamed the Body would consent to return your fervid affections in that way, but no matter how you wished it or even once or twice imagined it, no fantasized intimacy had ever crossed from ghostly image to physical sensation.

The Body…

You opened your eyes and looked over Ianthe’s shoulder to find the holy corpse of the Locked Tomb standing across the hall. You jolted back to your senses. You must have made a noise.

Ianthe’s reaction was immediate. She twisted around with unnatural speed, the trident knife withdrawn from some secret place and brandished in her offhand. Her speed did not surprise you, but the forearm slammed hard across your chest – protecting you – did. 

She found nothing, of course, and after a few tense moments her shoulders relaxed before she turned back to you, annoyance writ plain across her face.

“You little fruitcake, you startled me.”

You didn’t look at her, you were trying to read the expression on the Body’s lovely face. She was looking at you intently, hands crossed over the handle—pommel—of her longsword. Looking at her cleared your head like a plunge into cold salt water.

“I have to go,” you said softly, shame beginning to prickle the back of your mind. You were almost relieved to know you could still feel that emotion, but mostly you were beginning to panic that the Body had discovered you in the arms of another woman. She did not seem angry, merely expectant, but your cheeks were burning. You remembered your purpose.

Ianthe stood still, looking at you critically. She had sensed the abrupt shift in your attitude. Her body was still contoured to yours, your skirts commingled, her blood still tingling on your lips. The heat and scent of her enveloped you, but you were immune now.

“I have to go,” you repeated.

With a deep breath, as if fortifying herself, Ianthe slowly peeled herself from you and stepped back. Her face was a mask of cold contempt, the heat of the moment drained away. With a few pointedly brusque movements she smoothed her dress, then stood out of your way.

You saw that you had withdrawn the two-hander. You stepped past her. The Body fell in a half-step behind you. You had a Lyctor to hunt. 

As you walked away, you wiped the back of your hand across your mouth, snuffing the lingering sparks of thalergy playing about your lips. 

///////////////////////////////////////

When it was over, and you had failed in your mission, you took your bruised body and shredded sanity back to the only place you felt comfortable enough to sleep. Ianthe opened the door at your knock and looked at you incredulously.

“I don’t know which is more embarrassing, you coming back here, or the fact that I’m going to let you in.”

You just shook your head, uninterested in such banal questions as that, walked past her, and put yourself to bed.

**Author's Note:**

> Harrow and Ianthe's relationship to one another is just so fascinating. I don't ship it (or do I?), but the possibility of this scene and exploring their dynamic was just too amazingly hot not to write. That said, I took it as far as I thought was "realistic"...I hope it was enjoyable!


End file.
